


this thing between us is a rickety bridge

by sansbanshees



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: (for now) - Freeform, (it is), Angst, But not at the beginning, Cullen Rutherford Has Issues, F/M, Lyrium Addiction, Mages and Templars, OR IS IT, One-Sided Attraction, Rape/Non-con Elements, Trauma, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Unresolved Tension, fantasized non-con, i mean maybe later, ill-advised romantic entanglements, in a remotely healthy or productive way, lyrium addiction relapse, not in this anyway, not the least of which is handling his attraction to a mage, poorly negotiated smiting, pretty much just tension in general, so many issues, that he's constantly butting heads with
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-25
Updated: 2018-06-28
Packaged: 2019-04-08 02:57:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14095605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sansbanshees/pseuds/sansbanshees
Summary: He does not dislike her, despite appearances.But Maker, does she have the singular ability to set his blood aflame with little more than that combative look in her eyes.Or, Cullen is both attracted to and eternally frustrated by a mage that grants him no quarter.(It spirals downward from there)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please please please mind the tags and archive warnings before proceeding. The fantasized non-con within is never acted upon, but it's explicit and ugly and any relationship that may begin in later chapters will not start in a healthy place because Cullen himself is not in a healthy place (in this story, at least) and frankly, neither is Trevelyan.

“ _you fit into me like a hook into an eye_

_a fish hook_

_an open eye_ ”

-Margaret Atwood

  


  


Cullen cannot think in the Herald’s presence. He cannot focus. He can barely speak. His fists are clenched tight at his sides to stop himself from angrily gesticulating when she rejects even the soundest of his plans, simply because they came from him.

She is a Circle mage, Trevelyan, and holds not even the pretense of tolerance for Templars, current or former.

“We will incur losses if you disregard the failures of past sieges upon Redcliffe,” he says, again, a bite to his words that had not been there before. “ _Significant_ losses.”

The Herald sizes him up with an impatient look.

“What choice do we have?” It is not the question itself that rankles him, but the utterly dismissive way she asks it. “My people need help. Alexius has made _slaves_ of them. And we need them, so hang your—”

“Herald, we will lose!” The words slip out before he can,think to stop them. “Our forces could never hope to take Redcliffe should the worst come to pass. Ignoring the potential for allies elsewhere is madness!”

“Allies? The Templars?” Her eyes narrow. “Not even if they were the last people left alive.”

Only once before has he been so desperately furious. It takes every ounce of control he possesses to hold it in check. He cannot make the same mistake. Not now. Not with the entire world at stake.

He exhales, a slow release of air, willing the angry jump of his pulse to calm. “I understand your reservation.” And he does, of _course_ he does, this does not need to become another battle between them, so he softens his voice to draw the discussion back from that perilous brink. “Redcliffe is a trap. You know it is. You've been told as much. _Nothing_ can be done to save you if it’s sprung successfully. If we lose you, we lose all ability to close the Breach. If the Breach is not closed, we _all_ die.”

“Oh, do we? Thank you for that reminder. I'd nearly forgotten.” She glares at him, prepared to meet him on the field of battle despite his attempts to circumvent the clash of wills that’s become their custom when they occupy the same room. “And for the record, I have no reservations. Having reservations implies that I’m remotely considering your preference. I assure you, I’m not.”

She tilts her head, brows raised, all but daring him to take this further; a fool’s errand indeed.

He does not take the bait. Words of any kind are lost to him; he can scarcely keep himself from glaring like a seething child.

“Nothing else? No?” At his silence, Trevelyan nods, seemingly satisfied. “Good. Now, if you’re quite finished shouting down any plan you don’t approve of, perhaps you can listen to something that might change your mind.”

“There is a passage,” Leliana interjects, officious as always, as if she hasn’t just witnessed their squabbling. “One I learned of during the Blight, known to few outside of the Guerrin family.”

Leliana speaks of a route he _hadn’t_ known of, but a single covert path through the mill is hardly assurance of success. It’s barely defensible. They’ll be lucky to fit a tenth of the men he’d prefer to send in with the Herald to assure her safety, never mind the bottleneck a hasty exit will create. There will still be losses. They won’t be insignificant. One of them could still be _her._

And yet it will do him no good to point that out. The Herald has found her loophole, her validation to let her do what she planned to do anyway and nothing will dissuade her. He recognizes the steely look in her eyes as she listens, nodding along as her odds of success raise by the smallest margin. It’s conviction. Certainty. And it won’t be made to move.

So he keeps his opinion to himself, probing just enough to gather the details he’ll need to form as effective a strategy as he can. He nods and he listens, makes his notes and draws his plans, and when they adjourn, he departs without another word.

                                                                                                    

  


It isn’t until Cullen reaches the training yard that he allows himself to truly reflect upon the small council’s meeting. As he draws both sword and shield against a recruit, he finds himself drifting back to each infuriating moment, instinct assuming control to deflect the blows that come his way.

The Herald—is not wrong to avoid entertaining the notion of Templar aid, despite his own views on the matter. What reason has she to trust in them, given the life she led within the confines of a Circle? It's understandable. Expected, even. And what can he do but accept it and plan their missions accordingly? Railing at the thought of what could be, what might have been if she would only listen… But no one ever does, do they? Not until it's far too late.

It is a mistake to think of her in the midst of a spar. This is not the way to rid himself of the fury festering within, but he cannot stop. She frustrates him to no end and he is still caught too firmly in the grip of spite.

He does not dislike her, despite appearances. She is clever and observant, quick to take the measure of everyone around her. She tolerates little nonsense, a quality they seem to share. She is unyielding in her determination but not especially unkind, not to anyone that is not him, at least. Her humor is dry, when she deigns to share it; on the rare occasion that they reach a measure of camaraderie, she even makes him laugh. 

And though he’s tried not to see it, to keep any such observations held at bay, she is also undeniably lovely, perhaps precisely _for_ the dissonance of her features. The long, sharp line of her nose is at odds with the fullness of cheeks that dimple on the rare occasion that she smiles. The green of her eyes is soft as a bed of moss even as she narrows them to venomous slits. The plump curve of her mouth is so full he cannot deny his desire to trace its contours with his touch instead of his eyes, even with the sullen scowl that is so frequently a fixture upon her face when he is near.

Disliking her would be too easy. It would be for what she is rather than who she is. He refuses to allow himself the safety of a backslide into comfortable territory, forever the Templar standing in opposition to an obstinate mage. That she clearly sees him that way is enough of a deterrent. He will not resume that life. He will not be that man.

But Maker, does she have the singular ability to set his blood aflame with little more than that combative look in her eyes.

And so, even in the midst of his sparring, he reaches for the image of her in his mind, her skin hot beneath his fingers as they close around her wrist, the stirrings of fire beneath her flesh so fierce that his gloves can’t save him from being burned, and yet he doesn’t let go. He cannot let go.

It isn’t real. Some part of him knows that as he sidesteps the next blow with his shield raised high. She has no talent for fire of her own making. Only in others is she able to force newfound life into embers that might have died with quiet dignity had they just been left alone.

In his mind, she startles at his sudden hold, shock giving way to outrage, her eyes narrowing to slits. Her mouth opens on a demand that he can guess at well enough—‘let go, unhand me,’ all variations on the same furious theme—but he doesn’t give her the time to voice it. He spins her about, pressing her face to a wall as he towers over her, somewhere as dark and shadowed as the part of him that roars to life at the prospect of what he could do.

He pins her wrists above her head with one hand as the other roves downward, tugging at the waist of her pants as she struggles against him, the give of her ass against the strain of his cock so good, he cannot imagine surviving what comes next.

_Stop_.

Whether it’s her or his own better judgment that demands it makes no difference. He does not care. That alone is enough to turn his stomach, his guard dropping to a pitiful nothing.

In a way, he is thankful for the blow that knocks him off his feet. A riot of pain shoots down from his shoulder and only worsens when he tries to drag himself upright once his ears stop ringing.

The recruit that landed the blow rushes forward, her eyes brimming with concern. “Commander! I’m so sorry, I thought you’d—”

“No.” He waves off her apology as best he can as he tries once more to rise. “You did well. That is… the point of—”

“ _Slowly_ , Cullen.” The command in Cassandra’s voice all but demands obeisance, her strong grip providing the assistance he needs to reach his feet. “You may have broken something.”

He tries to lift his arm but the pain is so instant, so severe, it only makes him see white.

“No,” Cullen manages to say, wincing all the while. It’s a pain he is familiar with, one of the hazards that comes with rigorous combat training. “Not broken. Dislocated.”

Cassandra maneuvers herself beneath his good arm. “Come,” she says. “The sooner Adan can see to it, the better.”

They limp into Haven proper, past the tavern and up another small flight of steps, but Adan isn’t there when he and Cassandra make their way through the door of his lodgings.

The Herald is.

Trevelyan.

_Evelyn_ , some dim part of him interjects, a name she has not given him leave to use.

And so she shouldn’t.

She is bent over a table, her back to the door, a group of empty vials beside her arm as she and Solas work in tandem to fill them. The air is heavy with elfroot and spindleweed, an earthy scent Cullen recognizes from the healing wards at both Kinloch Hold and the Gallows. Healing droughts. As many as they can make, as fast as they can make them. The fledgling Inquisition is too small, too new for a proper team to supply these essentials.

It makes sense that she would be here, that she would jump in to assist. This is where her talents reside. It shouldn’t be surprising to see her.

It’s Solas that turns first at the sound of their entrance, his gaze roving over them both to assess the situation.

“What happened?” he asks.

“A training exercise gone wrong,” Cassandra explains. “Commander Cullen is—”

Trevelyan turns, dusting the residue from her hands along her thighs. “Sit him down.”

She is not curt with Cassandra, but neither is she friendly. Theirs, too, is a shaky alliance, due perhaps to the nature of their introduction. He was not there to see it, but given Cassandra’s certainty of the Herald’s guilt at the time, he cannot imagine it went well.

He is of no help to Cassandra in crossing the room, distracted by sharp pains that spear him through with every movement. It’s not until he sits that he notices how close the Herald is, moving in as Cassandra backs away.

“Can you move it?” Trevelyan asks, each piece of armor strapped to his arm removed and set aside with such efficiency, he might assume she’s donned armor herself for how quickly she plucks it off.

And then he remembers. She’s been a ward of the Circle nearly all her life. She’d have tended to every resident within, both mages and templars. It was a rare day that found any knight without armor, any knight at practice without some form of injury. None of this is new to her. It is not new to him either, finding himself injured and plunked down for a healer to sort out, and yet he feels nothing short of skittish beneath her care.

“Not well.” He cannot look at her as she splits the length of his sleeve. He cannot look away from her either, caught fast between the need to brave her proximity and the rising urge to flee when she rips the fabric clean away. If she only knew what made this happen. If she only knew the thoughts in his head, even now, the thunder of his pulse near deafening in his own ears as he recalls the moment that never was. Maker’s breath, why is she here? Where is Adan? “Is Adan not—”

“He’s busy.” She tucks her hair back behind her ear, sparing him another impatient look. “I’m afraid I’ll have to do in his stead.”

“I wouldn’t presume to doubt your—,” he bites back a curse when she presses at his shoulder, her hands sliding down to assess the damage, “—your competence.”

“Wouldn’t you?” But she isn’t looking for a response, leaving no room for one as she draws back to meet his gaze. “It’s out of joint. I can fix that, if you think me up to the task.”

He can hardly say no. The sooner this is remedied, the sooner he can get away from her, far enough to root out of the source of this monstrous voice in his head that clamors for him to pin her to the table at his back and bury himself between her thighs.

“Do it.” He is resigned to suffer this as he must, despairing of the way every inch of his skin seems to ignite in her presence.

She leaves him for a moment, pausing to speak with Cassandra where she stands with Solas before retrieving a thick strap of leather from a shelf nearby and making her way back. She lifts his face with a firm hand beneath his chin, the strap held in the other.

“Open your mouth.”

He does, his mouth gone dry, helpless to look anywhere but at her. She must notice. She has to. There is nothing subtle about it, but for once her thoughts on the matter remain a mystery. She slides the strap into his mouth, lodging it firmly within the grasp of his teeth.

“Bite.” She must sense his unease when he bites down. Something softens in her eyes, a flicker of empathy he does not deserve, there and gone in a flash. “I’ll make it quick.”

It's a small blessing that she misunderstands the cause of his tension for fear of the pain to come. Pain, he can endure. He does not think he can endure her knowing the truth. How right she is to loathe him, for he cannot imagine that she doesn’t.

Cullen closes his eyes when she steps to the side, nodding to signal his readiness for her to proceed. True to her word, she is quick to jolt his arm back to rights. It’s over with a sickening pop, a blinding flash of agony that settles to an aching throb in the aftermath, his jaw falling slack as the leather falls from his mouth and into his lap. He is vaguely aware of her hand settling at the base of his neck as he forces himself to take deep breaths; a gesture of comfort, he presumes, but accomplishing the exact opposite.

“Alright?” Trevelyan asks.

“Fine.” Even he would not be convinced, his voice tight and ready to snap. “Thank you.”

By some miracle, she does not press him further.

She bends his arm at the elbow, tucks it in close to his side and secures it there with freshly laundered bandages wound about his shoulder, her touches thankfully quick and fleeting. 

“If you’d like some friendly advice,” she says, almost conversationally as she finishes knotting the bandages, “the next time you have a shield in your hand? Block with it.”

It’s enough to startle a weak huff of laughter out of him. “That’s useful advice.”

“Do you think so?” Trevelyan glances down to him, wryness dimpling her cheeks, lifting her mouth to something near a smile, a look he could easily appreciate had it been directed at him before he was overcome with such vile, unwelcome imaginings. “I heard it once on my way past a training yard. You’d think the man that all but bellowed it would heed his own words.”

He forces his eyes away from the pretty quirk of her mouth. “He sounds a fool.”

“Mm. Bullheaded, too. Never budges an inch.” She shakes her head imperiously, like a Chantry Mother he’s managed to disappoint. “Perhaps he'll pull his head out from the confines of his ass one day.” 

If only that truly was the worst of him.

                                                                                                    

  


He dreams of the Herald that night.

It’s nothing like the youthful fancies his mind supplied at Kinloch Hold for a different woman. He thought he loved her, Solana Amell, the Hero of Ferelden who would go on to break a Blight in its tracks and send it running, his every imagining full of reverence, of quiet longing finally realized.

Until it wasn’t. Until it became a twisted thing in the hands of creatures that would use her to torment him. Overtures she would never have made, depravities he did not want and those—those he could endure, horrors of another kind but not enough to reach him because he knew they were not real. If the demons running rampant throughout the tower had not thought to bring her to him gently, to ply him with sweet words and quiet affection, to show him a glimpse of a future he should never have wanted—

Had a rescue not come at the moment it did, that would have been the end of him. He wonders if maybe it was and he's just failed to realize it in the years since.

There are no demons here to blame now, no whispered voices spilling like poison into his ear, nothing of love real or imagined dangled over his head to goad him into racing carelessly towards temptation. There is only him. His own mind. His own two hands tearing at the Herald’s clothes as if the garments are an affront to him personally.

The buttons of her coat pop off and scatter when he rips it open. She gasps and tries to jerk away, her hand splaying against his chest to dislodge him, utterly ineffectual and batted away with ease, her wrist pinned above her head to keep it from happening again.

He splits her shirt down the middle with one vicious rip, the thin fabric billowing out in tatters as he moves to tug down the faded breast band she wears, the only thing left that kept any sense of modesty alive.

_Cullen— Cullen, stop—_

Her voice is hoarse. Panicked. Wrong. He cannot bear to be the cause of it and yet he cannot stop it, removed from every action as if he were no more than a spectator, yet still so achingly present, every damning tremble of her body painfully tangible when he reaches to cup her small breast with a shaking hand.

She looks away from him then, her eyes shut tight as she tries to shrink back, wincing when he squeezes her, when he pinches her nipple and watches it draw tight.

She is so small, every part of her so small, her waist thin, hips narrow, every inch of her further dwarfed by the wide span of his hands.

He’s never thought her to be small before. She is not a woman of considerable height, let alone bulk, but she carries herself as if she is a fortress, as impenetrable as the castle he would steer her away from, if only she would listen. She would never allow this. She would never tolerate this. This is not her.

And if it isn’t her, perhaps this is not him either, a flimsy rationale to cling to, but cling he does when he tears at the laces of her pants, shoves them down and turns her as he had before, no recruit present now to bash him bodily from this nightmare.

He grips her by the hair, a thick handful pulled taut to keep her in place as he draws his cock out, pressing forward to align it with her cunt. The sound she makes could easily be mistaken for one of pleasure, of anticipation, but it isn’t. It never will be. He will live with the memory of it for the rest of his days. This is not a dream he will wake from and forget.

Sinking into her is a torment he has never known, pressure like a vise gripping at his cock as he presses inside, her cunt soft and warm but not nearly slick enough, rippling around him with every inch gained, resistant to the last. He cannot help but groan when he bottoms out inside of her, his hands flying to her hips as she goes rigid, her breath catching on a gasp.

He doesn’t fuck her slowly. He doesn’t give her a single moment to collect herself, to find some measure of ease at the feel of him within her. He draws her back hard by the hips and rocks his own forward even harder, the slap of his skin against hers an ugly sound in the stark silence around them.

It isn’t real.

It isn’t real.

_It isn’t real._

And yet it might as well be for all the good that does him now. Maker be merciful and strike him down, he does not want this. He wants it even less when he feels himself about to come, his balls drawing tight, bitten down nails digging into her hips as he fucks her with jerky, frantic thrusts, every sensation flooding through him with the most horrible clarity. But with it comes a newfound control over his body and he jerks out of her in time to watch the milky white of his own spend paint itself across the backs of her thighs.

He wakes with a strangled shout, chest heaving for breath as he scrambles to sit up, eyes searching desperately for the familiar sights within his tent to ground himself--his shield mere inches away. His sword in front of it, slid into its sheath. Armor hung neatly on a stand in the furthest corner, his coat draped over it. The flaps at the entrance of his tent, fluttering against the breeze.

This is not the first time he’s sought them upon waking from a nightmare.

He can feel his bedroll beneath him, soaked with sweat. His stomach, sticky with his own release.

He falls back and covers his face with his hands, driving the heels of his palms into his eyes as if it could somehow grind the image of what he's dreamed of into dust. Force it out of his head as if it had never found a home there at all.

Never again will he think of her this way. Never again will he demean her like this, as if she is no more than a thing to be used, brutalized, less than human because the Maker saw fit to to make her a mage.

And that must be the reason for this—he can think of no other. He will not blame this on the lyrium he refuses to take. The symptoms that plague him due to its lack. The fault is his, some insidious sickness he cannot rid himself of no matter how desperately he wishes to.

Never again.

He swears it to himself as if it means something. As if it means everything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic is attributable to both a prompt from the DA kink meme and what I'm gonna qualify as the most unhelpful anon I've ever been hit up by on Tumblr, who posed the question 'so what would a relationship between cullen and evelyn look like?' after I mentioned in that 'your inquisitor as a companion' meme that my Trev would not be fond of Cullen. At all. So of course my brain had to go there. Of course it did.
> 
> Thanks, brain.
> 
> Many thanks to my wonderful beta for putting up with my recent incessant Cullen obsession.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for references to the fantasized/dream non-con from the first chapter.

Cullen can scarcely bring himself to look at Trevelyan when the small council meets once more to finalize the infiltration of Redcliffe. Adjustments are made that he’s only dimly aware of, markers shuffled about on the map that he tries to pay attention to, yet the voices around him sound too far away to heed.

A sudden warmth brushes his side, the proximity of a body sliding dangerously close to his startling him to awareness. He glances down to find the Herald leaning across the map to shift a marker and he can do nothing but freeze in place, his heart hammering hard enough to breach his chest.

“Sorry,” she murmurs, casting him an apologetic look. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

Cullen blinks, the well of responses normally at his disposal running bone dry as she waits for some manner of response. He can’t decide if it’s terror or revulsion that grinds up his insides when he looks at her.

Her brow furrows. “Are you all right?”

Why she bothers asking, he cannot begin to guess. She is already appraising him, taking in the sheen of sweat he can feel gathering on his brow. Only a poor healer would take no notice of it and she is nothing if not adept; so much so that she reaches up to feel his face as if she expects to find him taken with fever.

He shifts just out of reach before she can touch him, managing, “Fine. I’m—I’m fine.” Glancing down at the map on the war table, he shakes his head. “You were saying, Leliana, an agent at each…each pillar, yes?”

“Perhaps we should adjourn.” Cassandra steps to the head of the table. She glances about the room, waiting for objections unlikely to come when she hasn’t phrased it as a question. Only the Herald dares part her lips to speak, but Cassandra is quick to head her off. “Until dusk, then.” She looks at Cullen, a stiff nod of her head towards the door. “A word, please.”

He follows Cassandra down the hall and into a room that typically serves as guest quarters for Josephine’s visitors of stature. It’s empty now, a state unlikely to continue as the Inquisition grows.

“You needn’t continue to suffer these symptoms on your own mettle, Cullen.” Cassandra’s voice is uncharacteristically gentled as she looks him over, no doubt seeing what the Herald did as well. “There are healers.”

He blinks, uncertain of Cassandra’s meaning.

And then it hits him. The lyrium. “No, Cassandra, it isn’t—”

“I understand your desire for discretion,” Cassandra cuts him off, assuming an entirely different meaning to the denial, one he ultimately finds himself too cowardly to refute when the truth is much worse. “I have understood since the moment you made your intention to stop your lyrium rations clear. I do not mean to belittle your decision, I merely wish to suggest seeking aid.”

“It’s…manageable, for now.” He manages to meet her gaze. “The moment it isn’t, you will be the first to know.”

It’s not strictly false—he is faring better than he anticipated. Never mind that it isn’t the reason for his current unease.

Cassandra arches a brow. “Perhaps you might consider my suggestion to keep it from progressing to that point.”

“I will take it under advisement.” He forces a brief smile, enough of an assurance that her stance loosens. “Thank you, Cassandra. But I’m all right.”

“You did not _look_ it.”

A pointed reminder, and one he’d rather not think on. It’s fortunate that he is not close with Trevelyan lest she, too, expect an in-depth explanation, one he would not be able to bluff his way through.

She—unsettles him. In every way.

“But you are right,” Cassandra relents. “You seem—better, I suppose. Less troubled.”

If only that were true.

“If that’s all,” he glances towards the door, “I should like to oversee the training yard this morning. Recruitment is on the rise and some still require assessment.”

“Of course.” Cassandra’s gaze drifts to his still bandaged arm. “Have a care that your participation is less...hands on. I am sure that the Herald will be displeased, should her work be undone.”

There is no helping the heat that rises in his face. “I would hate to displease her.”

“You dislike her.” Cassandra states it as if it is a well known fact, something circulating out in the open for loose tongues to gossip over.

“No, I…” He ducks his head, uncertain how to offer a satisfactory explanation. “I think—I think perhaps it’s difficult to…to overcome the divide.” It’s closer to the truth than he would like to admit. It is no simple dislike that has influenced him. If it was, he would not feel such shame in the admission. “I shall try to improve the situation.”

“As will I.” Cassandra glances down, as if she believes herself guilty of the same sins. His guilt for playing into her assumptions threatens to crush him. “We cannot afford to allow ourselves the comfort of falling to familiar roles. She is doing her part. We must do ours. Petty squabbles only pave the way for whoever is behind the Breach to slip further from our grasp.”

“Yes.” What else can he say? Cassandra is right, as she often is, and her earnest desire to overcome whatever misgivings she may have towards the Herald only serve to magnify his shame. “We can do no less.”

He must do better than this. He must not allow himself to sink any further. There is too much at stake, too much work to be done, and though he wishes otherwise, there is only one path forward from here if he means to salvage even the possibility of a civil relationship with the Herald.

It starts with an apology.

 

* * *

 

When Cullen reaches Trevelyan’s door that night, his stomach is in knots. For a moment, he simply stands in front of it, willing himself to gather enough courage to knock.

What will he say if she answers? What will he do if she _doesn’t_? How can he hope to speak to her in earnest with the images already threatening to overtake his every thought?

 _Never again_ , he reminds himself, but already the proclamation is losing strength. He cannot so much as think of her without recalling the slick heat of her rippling around him and it had not even been real, much less wanted.

He nearly abandons the notion of seeking her out, but his unbound arm raises as if by its own volition, and the knock upon her door seems to echo throughout the sleeping village. His stomach plummets at the volume of it. In the silence that follows, his pulse begins a steady climb.

She does not answer. There is not even the tell-tale shuffle of feet approaching the door. Either she is not within, or…

He turns like the coward he is, content to let a solitary attempt be effort enough.

The door creaks open.

“Are you dying?” The voice at his back has passed beyond tired and into exhaustion, scratchy and threadbare. “Are we under attack?”

Cullen forces himself to exhale, digging deep for composure as he turns to face her.

“No. No one is dying, at least as—”

The sight that greets him is enough to chase the words from his mind.

She’s come straight from a bath. Her hair is still dripping, her face still shining with moisture. She’s clad in a garment so thin it can scarcely be called a shift and the water falling from the ends of her hair is soaking the fabric covering her chest, a swath of translucence spreading further by the second, the small curve of her breasts already a prominent display.

His eyes snap up to hers. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Her brow furrows. “For what?”

“For—for earlier,” He nearly groans aloud at his utter inability to speak. “It, um, it can wait.”

She studies him with narrowed eyes.

All of a sudden, he’d very much like to be anywhere but here.

“It’s not endearing, you know. This bumbling act of yours.” She crosses her arms over her chest, glints of green light pulsing softly from the mark on her hand. “What do you want?”

His mind blanks at the question. “I…I don’t know.”

For once, he’s able to give an honest answer. He doesn’t know. He hasn’t the faintest clue what he’s looking for beyond offering some scraped together apology she likely doesn’t care to receive. It isn’t the things he’s dreamed of; he’s certain of that much. The very thought curdles his stomach.

But there is something, isn’t there? Something he cannot hope to name, some strange compulsion rising up to be nearer to her. To reach for her. To flee and never look back.

It’s unsettlingly familiar.

“You don’t know.” She regards him with a skeptical look. “Well. That’s…helpful.”

“As I said,” he inclines his head, eager to leave this for another time, particularly one that finds her less—exposed. Or perhaps never. “It can wait.”

“Apparently, it can’t.” There is a weary sort of amusement in her voice, one matched by a wry quirk of her mouth, as appealing a look as he thought it to be the day before. “You’re here.”

“I’m sorry for that.” He gestures vaguely in her direction, to her wet hair, her wet shift, careful not to let his eyes follow the path of his hands. Wanting to look despite the myriad of reasons he shouldn’t. “For intruding at so late an hour. It was thoughtless of me.”

“Yes, you’re very sorry, we’ve established that.” A thread of impatience winds into her voice, so familiar it’s nearly a comfort, her geniality fading with the clench of a fist beneath her crossed arms. “Do you need something or not?”

 _No_ , he means to tell her. He does not need. He wants. He wants something that barely has a shape let alone a name, something so like a want he’s felt before that it nearly guts him where he stands. But it isn’t—it can’t be, he _cannot_ be so stupid as to put himself in the same pit he clawed his way out of so long ago.

That, he does _not_ mean to tell her. That, he all but chokes on, struggling for an answer he _can_ give, but she gasps before he can speak, a small, pained sound, barely more than a hiss of breath.

Concern stamps out the noise of his thoughts. He reaches for her without thinking, setting his hand gently against the arm she cradles now, flickers of green pulsing stronger from her palm.

He didn’t know, didn’t even _ask_ whether the mark troubled her past the sealing of the initial tear in the veil at the Conclave.

“What can I do?” he asks, his voice hushed to a near whisper. Her arm trembles beneath his palm.

“Nothing.” She pries herself away from his touch, her face pale, jaw clenched. “It happens. It will pass.”

Cullen draws back, uncertain how to proceed. He knows so little of her domain—field dressings at best, staunching bleeding and pushing droughts, not nearly enough to be of any use to her. “I’ll fetch Adan.”

Trevelyan shakes her head. “Don’t bother. I’ve sent him to the Crossroads for the next few days to assist Mother Giselle. If you want to help…” She pauses, as if uncertain of accepting his assistance, much less asking for it.

“I _do_ ,” he says, a gentler insistence than he has ever spoken to her before.

It’s not a surprise to him that he means it. What surprises him is how little he wouldn’t do, if she asked it of him. Perhaps it’s guilt that drives him. Or perhaps it’s something more, somewhere just beneath the thorny brambles that shred him to pieces when it comes to her.

Her eyes widen, the expression that follows falling somewhere between dismay and disbelief. “Maker’s breath, what are you, a prat or a puppy? _Pick_ one.”

The remark lands with a sting, but he does not allow himself to linger upon the injury.

She winces at the next pulse of light, her query set aside as she draws her hand in closer to her chest. “Just—find Solas. Please.”

“Of course.” Cullen offers a small nod of assent as he steps back. Wounded pride is no reason to delay the help she’s asking for. “Will you—” _be alright_ , he means to ask, but she turns away before he can and disappears inside, her door shutting with a decisive thud.

He hangs his head, but he does not linger. She asked for Solas. What can he do but fetch?

 

* * *

 

The Herald does not appear at the small council’s meeting come morning.

She does not attend in the evening, either.

Once is understandable, given the state she was in the night before. He has been able to think of little but the pallor of her face and the tense set of her jaw since he left her doorstep. Twice… Twice is unlike her, if she is not in the field.

“Where is...” Cullen begins to ask, searching for Trevelyan as he takes his place at the war table.

“The Herald?” Leliana asks.

He nods.

“She is…unwell.” Leliana begins, as if uncertain how to classify what ails her.

“The anchor,” Josephine explains further, a flicker of sympathy crossing her face. “Sealing the first rift at the Conclave calmed it a great deal, but new rifts form every day. Their accumulation seems to…make it worse. Solas has suggested that sealing more may calm it further, but she is not yet able to travel.”

He should have known what was happening to her. He should have been told. He should have _asked_. “Is there nothing else we can try?”

There must be some other way, a more immediate solution, something to act as a balm now, rather than later. And then it hits him, with all the subtlety of a slap in the face.

It’s not an injury, the mark she bears. It’s magic. The same magic that created the Breach. The same Breach that requires aid to bolster the Herald’s ability to close it; aid he would sooner seek from the Templars of Therinfal Redoubt, and not only for the multitude of ways in which their fortress can be overtaken. Templars negate magic. They weaken it at every turn. That skill is the very core of the Order’s identity.

He is almost afraid to suggest it, knowing the likely reception he will receive. It is that fear which cements his resolve to speak. “Perhaps it can be dampened. Neutralized, even temporarily.”

For a moment, there is silence.

The implication of what he suggests is not lost on him. He’s never seen Silence cast upon a mage as a kindness meant to aid them. He’s never resorted to it as a _punitive_ measure himself—there has always been an intent to protect bystanders from being caught in the crossfire of apostates and blood mages bent on doing harm—but it is no peaceful or painless process, no matter the intent.

“What would you have her do?” Leliana finally asks, incredulous. “Ask you to smite her?”

“No, not—not me.” He draws back from the table, recoiling from the assumption that he would perform it, despite the possibility of a solution that it poses. He cannot do that to her. He cannot be the cause of even well-intentioned harm. And he _can’t_ , even if he was willing to try. It’s been months since his last ration of lyrium, the abilities he used to command beyond his reach without it. Resuming its use is the one concession he will grant to no one. “Is she… is there no one she would trust to try?”

“No.” Leliana’s answer is paired with a decisive shake of her head. “Not from any Templar, even former ones. The only person _I_ know with Templar training that took no vigil is likely crawling through the Deep Roads as we speak and I doubt a raven will be able to reach him, if she did agree to it.”

So immediate a dismissal unsettles him, even knowing that Leliana is likely right. There has been too much of this as of late, ignoring solutions that do not come in a tidy package. Refusing the more difficult route and calling it expediency.

“We’re meant to advise her, are we not?” Despite the dubious arch of her brow, he goes on. “Perhaps it’s not a palatable option. Not for anyone. But she should at least be made aware of the idea. If it works—”

“And it may not,” Leliana is quick to remind him. “The rifts still need to be sealed. This wouldn’t spare her that. Even asking the question may sever the little trust we’ve managed to cultivate. We _need_ her, Cullen. Put yourself in her place. How would you react?”

Not well. He has been in similar positions, relying on open apostates to carry out the most delicate of tasks. He cannot say that he handled it with any amount of grace before being proven wrong. Yet he _was_ wrong, nearly every time.

“She should be told,” he insists. “It is our duty to present _every_ option.”

“It is,” Josephine says, lifting her gaze from the tablet she carries to glance from Leliana to Cullen. “I will ask. We’ve a friendly enough rapport. She will not like the sound of it, but perhaps I can deliver it in a way that is less likely to drive her away.”

Cullen nearly agrees, a wave of relief preparing to pass over him, but—he has been cowardly long enough. It’s too expedient a solution, too easy and entirely unfair to ask of Josephine when she has so many other matters to settle on the Inquisition’s behalf. He cannot let her take this on as well. His standing with the Herald is already in tatters; there is little of it left to tarnish.

“You’ve enough to contend with, Josephine.” Knowing it’s the right course to take does nothing to ease the pit of dread settling in his stomach. This—will not end well. He knows it won’t. But what else can he do? “It was my idea. I will take it to her.”

“Are you certain?” Josephine does not appear convinced. The look in her eyes is skeptical, at best. “If you do this, you mustn’t be so…”

“Myself?”

“Yes,” she agrees, all too quickly. “Not to be overly critical, of course.”

“I _am_ capable of diplomacy, on occasion.”

Only he isn’t, not with the Herald. But Leliana and Josephine say nothing more about it, content to allow him the honor of serving his own head to Trevelyan on a platter as they move on to discuss other matters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All the hugs to eveninglottie for letting me bend her ear about where the hell this story is going and for rooting out the worst of my bad writing habits with ruthless efficiency. Lots of commas died in the editing process, folks. It was like a slaughterhouse.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perhaps she will be reasonable. Perhaps she won’t shut him down at the first sign of alarm. She doesn’t likely care that the mark is a danger to her personally, but risking herself so carelessly for no objective at all may be enough to appeal to her pragmatism. It’s possible. But he thinks it unlikely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tags have been updated to reflect the sensitive content found in this chapter. A good time is had by no one, here. Please mind the tags before proceeding.

The moment he leaves the Chantry, Cullen is bombarded.

“Report from Knight-Captain Rylen, ser!” announces Ainsley, stepping forward from the huddled crowd of aides awaiting Cullen outside the Chantry doors.

“And an update on the Fallow Mire from Harding,” adds Barlow, though she, at least, declines to impose upon his space, content to let the information speak to its own importance.

Right. This. The unrelenting noise and need and work. This, he can do, a welcome distraction before he seeks the Herald. It may even help, accomplishing _something_ before he throws himself face first into a stone wall.

“You there,” Cullen turns his attention to an as yet silent aide, Clifton, who takes on the wide-eyed look of a startled deer the moment he’s addressed. “What do you have?”

“I—“ Clifton finds his feet after a moment, his shoulders squaring. “I’ve found another supplier, ser. From the Merchant’s Guild. They’re waiting to speak with you about lyrium for our Templar trained.”

“That’s no unimportant matter,” Cullen tells him. He’s competent enough, Clifton, but too complacent to wait his turn, content to mill about in the background. “Speak up, next time. You’ll never be heard if you don’t.”

Clifton reddens but jerks his chin downward in a stiff nod. “Yes, ser.”

“Show them to command tent and find Lysette,” Cullen directs him. “I’ll speak with them once she’s verified the quality of their lyrium.” He turns back to the others, prepared for the onslaught.

Or so he thought.

What could have been an hour of work drifts far past that, negotiations with the Merchant’s Guild entirely to blame for the delay, the halting, contentious dialogue saved only by Josephine’s intervention to secure a price reasonable to both parties. By the time Cullen finishes there and returns a mountain of requisition orders to Threnn, the sun has already begun to set. There is still a tall stack of field reports waiting for him in the command tent, still Harritt to find, armor and weapons repairs to arrange before a deployment to the Fallow Mire. He should see to it soon, _now_ , but his window to find the Herald has nearly closed. He does not dare impose upon her so late _again_ —she’s liable to skin him, and that’s without any mention of the plan he means to propose. That—that will earn him worse, he’s no illusions otherwise.

He tasks his aides with Harritt; the rest will have to wait.

The village is quiet as he walks to her door, dimmed and peaceful in a way that only magnifies the tension pulling in his chest, a calm in the air that denies him any distractions. There is only him. His own mind. The heavy wooden door ahead with hinges that creak and the Herald beyond it, a mage he must somehow convince that he means to help her, despite appearances to the contrary.

As if that will work. As if she won’t throw him out on his ear the moment he utters the word Silence.

Wouldn’t he do the same in her place? _Didn’t_ he do the same? To Hawke, to Orsino and Thrask, to anyone foolish enough to presume him the reasonable man he should have been? How many times did they try to reach him? How many times did he shut them down, unwilling to consider even the most sensible appeals?

_Save a last minute change of heart_ , he thinks, his own words come back to haunt him, his vision too clouded by fear and anger back then to see the Gallows for what it truly was; a pyre already burning beyond anyone’s arrogant notion to control it.

That is all he can hope for from Trevelyan. A last minute change of heart. The odds of it are slim. He should know that better than anyone. It took him the better part of a decade to arrive here, to leave the Order in favor of an uncertain path, free to choose as he sees fit. And what has he done with that freedom but choose to look upon the only person capable of saving this world as no more than a thing, an outlet to force his anger into because she dared to spurn his input? What has _she_ done with the freedom she’s found but thrive and prove him wrong, time and again?

Perhaps she will be reasonable. Perhaps she won’t shut him down at the first sign of alarm. She doesn’t likely care that the mark is a danger to her personally, but risking herself so carelessly for no objective at all may be enough to appeal to her pragmatism. It’s _possible_. But he thinks it unlikely.

He should have let Josephine do this. He should have begged her and offered to absorb any task she wished to shed to make up the difference. This will not be an objective discussion. It will not even _be_ a discussion. There is too much distrust between them even without the Herald knowing the things he is capable of imagining, the parts of him that whisper of it still. He is the _last_ person that should be here; he wants too much from her, wildly disparate things he can’t hope to reconcile and another confrontation will not resolve it. It will only make it worse.

He knocks anyway. There is nothing to do but forge ahead. He is not here solely for the world’s sake; he is also here for her. If he can remember that, if he can cling to that, perhaps it will not go the way he thinks.

Again, there is no answer. This time, he resigns himself to wait.

And wait.

He makes his way to her window and peers within. There is nothing to see apart from darkness. She could be resting, but it seems unlikely. Any knock upon her door could be urgent and she is not the type to shirk her duties where they find her. She proved as much last night.

If she isn’t here, there is only one other place she is likely to be. He crosses the village to reach it, a walk made shorter by doubling his pace, Adan’s clinic coming into view as he ascends the stairs . There is light within, the warm glow of torches spilling from the windows.

He knocks only as a courtesy before he opens the door and steps through it, the clinic a somewhat neutral ground and safe enough to impose upon without invitation.

The Herald sits at Adan’s desk, a quill in her hand and a ledger beside her arm. The surface of the desk is littered with bottles of all sizes, bundled herbs, and haphazardly stacked pouches. She looks away from them briefly, sparing a glance to identify her visitor.

“Commander.” Her greeting is short but it isn’t the clipped, impatient tone she normally favors when she speaks to him. “Did you forget to block again?”

The question startles a sputtered laugh out of him and he braves a few step towards her. “Not yet, no.” He gestures to the empty chair beside the desk. “May I?”

At her nod, he takes the seat, allowing himself a moment to study her, cautious not to let his gaze linger too long. She looks…hollow, sunken, shadows clinging to the puffy skin beneath her eyes. Her hair is drawn back in a loose knot, the black of it seeming darker than usual against the ill pallor of her skin. Her marked hand is tightly bandaged, the grease of a potent smelling salve shining on the skin that is not covered by fabric. The mark may not be actively killing her, but it isn’t aiding her health.

“You should be resting,” he blurts out, unable to keep the thought to himself.

“I could say the same to you.” She sets her quill down and shifts her weight, turning to face him as she gestures to the shoulder she set not two days ago. “I hope you’ve been gentle with that.”

“I _have_ ,” he insists, grasping too quickly for defense when there’s been no attack. An amused little smile twitches at the edges of her mouth at his reaction. It suits her, that look, the flicker of mischief in her eyes, as if she’s happened upon a new lever to pull. He glances away with a sheepish smile of his own, willing the heat that rises beneath his collar to stop short of his face as he considers the things he’d be willing to do to see that look again. “That is, I wouldn’t…risk your ire.”

“Of course not,” her smile widens the smallest bit, “you clearly live in fear of it.”

The only response he can manage is an awkward sort of chuckle.  Anything more and she’ll see right through him. Not everything, not plainly, she is no blood mage, no demon rooting about in his mind for weaknesses to exploit—yet she doesn’t need to be, does she? She finds them well enough on her own. Or perhaps he offers them too easily. Either way, she takes to rattling him as if she were born to it. A slow growing part of him doesn’t mind it as much as he ought to.

“Is there a reason you’re here?” she finally asks, an unfamiliar levity to the question. “Or do you still not know?”

It nudges him further off balance, the airy amusement in her voice, as if they find themselves on the verge of something warmer than mere camaraderie, a glimpse of how they could be, if not for everything else. It’s an opportunity he wants to seize—he _likes_ these hints of things he’s not been privy to before, these moments that add a few new pieces to the puzzle of her. Dousing whatever this is, what it might become, it’s the last thing he wants to do.

“Yes,” his expression falters as the reality of the situation rushes back in, “there is.”

“And here I thought it was the pleasure of my company.” But she studies him for a moment, her levity fading as she takes in the grim set of his mouth. “All right. Out with it.”

“Your mark,” he begins, dreading what is to come, “Solas says that sealing more rifts may help?”

“He does.” The look in her eyes is wary. “Why do you ask?”

“Have you—” he clears his throat, glancing away, “—have you thought what you might do if it… if it has no effect?”

“It worked before,” she points out, “stands to reason that it will again. I’ve been cooped up too long, is all.”

“You don’t see a need to prepare an alternative,” he asks, gesturing to her bandaged hand, “given your current—”

“Cullen.” She does not call him that. She never calls him by name and he is careful to follow her lead in that regard. It’s either a promising sign or a very bad one. “Get on with it.”

“I hope it works. Truly, I _do_ ,” he says, genuine in the desire, “but you must be ready for the possibility of failure.”

“Must I?” There’s a dangerous edge to the question—the wrong response and this fragile ceasefire crumbles to bits. “And what alternative would you have me prepare? I assume you have a plan.”

“Not—quite, no.” It’s not truly a plan. It’s barely an idea, one he is _less_ eager to divulge. “More of a…suggestion. Something to consider. What you do with it—”

“Is up to me?” Suspicion smothers whatever might have been left of her goodwill. “That’s generous of you.”

“That is _not_ —” but he catches himself before he can snap back, before he mangles this beyond all repair. It takes a slow breath to settle himself enough to attempt a safer route. “Your mark. It’s an unfamiliar magic, but…perhaps not so different from what we _are_ familiar with and I—I wondered if it couldn’t be dampened somehow to spare you the worst of its effects, silenced or—”

“ _Silenced_?” She echoes the word in disbelief, a look of disgust twisting its way onto her face. “Are you _deranged_?”

It’s lighter than he anticipated, her reaction, but not a stance to be _reasoned_ with. Why he tries…maybe she’s not so far off in her assessment. “I know how it sounds. I know it’s not…pleasant.”

“Not pleasant?” Her face tightens. “That’s a fucking understatement.”

“A poor choice of words,” he grants, and if that isn’t something he _always_ seems to step in with her—the wrong words, the wrong topic, the wrong plan, “I only meant…I want to _help_ you.”

“ _Help_ me?” She scoffs in disbelief. “By torturing me?”

“And that _isn’t_?” He gestures stiffly to her bound hand, the soft pulse of light glowing beneath her bandage. “I _saw_ you last night. What this is doing to you. What if it gets worse? What if it doesn’t stop? What I’m asking you to consider…I know what it means for you. But if it works—“

“What it _means_? You don’t have the faintest idea what it _means_!” She draws back with a snarl, her eyes wild with fury. “You’ve doled it out. You’ve seen it. That doesn’t mean you _know_. Think of the worst pain you’ve ever felt and then multiply it by a hundred. A thousand. You’re still nowhere close. It’s like _dying,_ Templar. Wishing you could, but you’re not allowed the reprieve. _That_ is what you’re asking me to do.”

“I’m asking you to _consider_ it,” he reminds her, struggling for composure, “as a _last_ resort, if you prefer. You need _options_ , Herald, even options you don’t like! That is what it _takes_ —”

“No.” She shakes her head. “Not this. You _cannot_ expect me to put myself at the mercy of someone trained in the art of destroying me. I’d sooner—”

“You’d sooner what? _Die_?” He throws his hand up, giving in to frustration. “Are you _truly_ that selfish? Do you care so little what happens to everyone else that you’d take the risk, if it comes to that? You _know_ how important you are!”

It’s a blow too low, but he makes no attempt to walk it back. Her eyes widen as if he’s wounded her, a flash of raw pain that flees when she remembers her anger.

“ _Fine_ ,” she snaps, extending her hand, “do it, then!”

Of course she would ask that. Of course she would demand the one thing he cannot do. “No, I—I can’t. Rylen, perhaps, if you’d prefer someone—”

“No. Not Rylen. Not Lysette. Certainly not _Mattrin_.” Her demeanor darkens further, her eyes narrowing as her mouth tugs down into a scowl. “Don’t you dare shove me off to someone else because you’re feeling delicate about it.”

He should have expected this. He should have known it would go this way.

“I _can’t_.” The sharp edge in his voice veers dangerously close to a snarl. She deserves an explanation and he’s prepared to grant her that much, despite his rising fury. “If you would listen—”

“I’m _done_ listening. It’s your turn.” She leans forward, her mouth curling back in a sneer. “If you’re bold enough to ask me to do this, you damn well ought to be bold enough to do it yourself. You might be a Templar, but I won’t tolerate a coward.” She extends her hand again, glaring daggers. “Go on, then. Do your worst.”

He does not take her hand gently; he snatches it with a stiff jerk. It won’t work, of course. And when it doesn’t, she’ll have to take him at his word. She’ll have to concede. He is tired of being the only one that loses.

Her skin is hot against his hand, feverish, but not the wildfire he imagined it to be. Her fingers are tinged an angry red, her wrist swollen. The salve smeared on her skin is greasy beneath his touch and her hand nearly slips away from his when he grips it too firmly.

Not once does her stare waver. Not once does she look away from him, tilting forward from the edge of her seat with a glare, but he is too angry to wilt beneath it now.

At his best, focusing the weight of Silence on so small an area as her hand might have been possible. He made competent use of his training with little in the way of flare, opting for strength rather than precision, but given a need to act otherwise, he likes to think he’d have risen to the challenge. He is far from his best now, focus eluding him until he closes his eyes to shut her out.

The lyrium left in him is no more than scraps, withered and fading, but it answers, the whisper of it a frail echo of the ready shout it had been before. Drawing from it is another matter, a task akin to forcing blood from a stone. Useless. It’s useless and he nearly gives up the charade but his eyes open, gaze flicking towards the mess of bottles upon the desk. Cullen knows what he’ll find before his gaze settles on it—a small vial peeking out beneath a bundle of herbs, the swirling liquid inside it bright and blue.

He does not think. If he thinks, he will hate himself for this, for snatching it up with a shaking hand and thumbing it open, nearly retching when the first sickly sweet drop hits his tongue. If there is anything in this moment to be grateful for, he is grateful that she won’t understand the significance of this. Angry does not begin to describe what he feels towards her right now but this—she did not ask _this_ of him.

Yet he can give no less than he’s asked of her. The worst pain, multiplied by a hundred. A thousand. Still nowhere close.

No heady rush accompanies the dose. He does not feel an onslaught of power. The world does not abruptly right itself after a year long tilt. He only feels steady, stronger, as if he’s beaten back a lingering illness. It’s an insidious lie, this fleeting vigor, one that will steal his mind and kill him slowly should he continue to feed it, but with it comes a renewed focus and a small pool of lyrium to draw from. That is the _only_ thing he allows himself to think about.

The mere intent to summon Silence is enough to bring it forth and he is not prepared, the force familiar but his control of it erratic, unpracticed as if he is no more than a green recruit. The crushing weight of it spills far past the boundaries he intended and engulfs half the room, the Herald ensnared fully in its midst. But there is no stopping it now, not if it stands half a chance at success, and that is all he can hope for.

The muscles of her hand go rigid in his grip. Her shoulders lock, trembling with effort to withstand the pressure as every ounce of magic in her is smothered, forced out as if it never belonged there in the first place. Her breaths cease, pain slowly contorting her features, but she does not look away. She holds his gaze for every agonizing moment. How long it lasts, he cannot say, but it feels an eternity to him—he cannot imagine what it feels like to her. It is only the quiet noise of her distress that finally unravels his control, a whimper dampened by the clench of her teeth that he cannot stand the sound of.

She wavers as Silence recedes, listing forward like near dead weight when he lets go of her hand. He reaches for her again immediately, uncertain whether his help will even be accepted, much less welcomed.

“Herald—”

“ _Shut up_ ,” she hisses, or tries to, her voice too reedy for venom. She ignores his offered hand, flattening her own against his thigh to brace herself instead, the other clutching her chest. “I can’t—I can’t _breathe_.”

Her elbow buckles beneath her weight and he surges forward too late to stop her from falling, the legs of his chair scraping against the floor as it slides back from the force of his exit. He catches her by the elbow and drags her in close, twisting to take the brunt of the impact when they hit the floor. His shoulder does not thank him for the blow but he can’t find it in himself to care about that when she’s gasping for air against him, limp and wheezing and utterly dependent on him for aid. Pain, he can endure. Failing her now, he _cannot_ endure. He has already done enough damage to her for one lifetime. The _rest_ …the rest, he cannot think on or he will be lost.

He wrests his arm from the sling that holds it and turns her gently to her back, ignoring the burning strain of muscle and sinew as he slides his hand beneath her head to cushion it against the unforgiving flagstones beneath them. She’s still conscious, her eyes thin-slitted and fluttering to stay open. Sharp, wheezing sounds slip past her lips as she struggles to draw breath in frantic, fruitless gulps.

“Breathe in through your nose,” he murmurs, recalling his own method to breathe through panic, let alone agonizing pain, and rests his hand gently against her chest to slow her down. The breath she draws is sharp and still too fast, but she holds it for a beat, caught on to what he means to talk her through. “Out through your mouth, now. Slower, if you can.”

It takes time for her breathing to steady. It’s only when the haze begins to clear from her eyes that he realizes his hand is still on her chest, the slowed beat of her heart knocking against the splay of his fingers. He draws back slowly, certain it’s gone from comfort to trespass. What to say…Maker, what _can_ he say to her?

“What now?” Her voice is a quiet rasp. She does not waste the energy it would take to turn her head to look at him, her eyes staring up at the ceiling. “Kick me while I’m down? Drag me off to a cell? I’m rusty at this.”

“No,” he shakes his head and reaches over to tilt her face towards him so he can look at _her_. “ _No_. Evelyn, I’m—“

“Oh, it’s Evelyn now? That’s—that’s _funny_.” The sound she makes is part laugh, part hiccup, and only makes her wince. “I can’t…I can’t get up.” It seems to pain her to admit it. “Never could, after. Not for hours.”

“I’ll take you home. I’ll _carry_ you.” He starts to roll back. “Just let me—“

She reaches to still him, heavy-limbed and clumsy, more a flimsy bat of her hand against his side than a touch. “You _can’t_.” Were she able to, he’s certain she’d jab a finger into his shoulder to emphasize her point. “Idiot.”

His throat tightens. How can she think of _him_ at a time like this? “I’ll find someone. Solas, he’s just—“

“ _No_.” The shake of her head is meant to be emphatic, he thinks, but it only looks pained, the effort pulling her face into another wince. “I’ve been very…very stupid and he won’t…I don’t want to hear it. Not now.”

“I can’t just leave you here.” He _won’t_ , even as out of his depth as he finds himself. He’s never helped after doing this. It’s…he never _kicked_ anyone, after, never _dragged_ them to confinement, but it didn’t make him any better than the ones that had. “I’m sorry. I should never have—“

“Don’t. Don’t do that. Just…“ She pauses to drag in a slow breath, her eyes flicking up towards the ceiling once more. “Just make sure I don’t die in my sleep.”

At his nod, her eyes drift shut. Pins and needles skitter up his arm, nerves twitching with every minuscule movement she makes against his hand as it falls asleep beneath her head, yet he doesn’t dare move it. He scarcely dares to breathe, loathe to disturb the silence. She needs rest now, more than anything.

But a question lingers in his mind, more insistent with every moment it goes unasked.

“Evelyn?”

Her answer is a quiet “Hmm?”

“Did it…” He hesitates, the reason behind the question he wants to ask undeniably selfish. If he’s wrong, if it didn’t work, if it was all for _nothing_ … “Did it work?”

Her silence continues so long, he assumes she’s fallen asleep without hearing him. And then—

“No,” she says, quietly.

“Oh,” is all he can think to say, but really, it seems to him that such a devastating answer should have been spoken a bit louder.


End file.
